


From Here to Eternity

by kirschtrash



Series: Musical Musings [9]
Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: Alive Marco Bott, Alternate Universe - Scientists, Angst and Feels, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Angst with a Happy Ending, Astronomy, Fluff and Angst, M/M, Mild Hurt/Comfort, Science Boyfriends
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-15
Updated: 2018-06-15
Packaged: 2019-05-23 21:48:17
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,872
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14941970
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kirschtrash/pseuds/kirschtrash
Summary: "You'll reach the stars, Jean. I know you will - and I'll take you there, if that is what it'll take."





	From Here to Eternity

**Author's Note:**

> If you're curious as to where I was gone for all this time, [here's](http://kirschtrash.tumblr.com/post/174765527362/why-i-went-on-a-hiatus-i-didnt-know-i-needed) a post of me explaining myself however way I could.
> 
> This work is inspired by [this](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=xs-PzathtLA) beautiful track!
> 
> And do note: I've tried to do as much research for this as I possibly could, but some things I had to twist to set it with my story. Do keep in mind that its technically still the snk-verse but with the characters set in the modern day. I hope that doesn't get confusing!  
> This is something realy different from my usual style, but still - enjoy this read, my loves <3

The stagnant air was thick with cigarette smoke and old coffee, sticking to his skin like sweat on a hot day. A mess of papers - torn, crumpled and whole - were strewn across every table top, some even stacked up high. The lights did the best they could at lighting up the small room, with energy they had left even after ten years of disuse; the ceiling fan on the other hand could only spin with lethargy, making a tired humming sound as it did.

Jean Kirschtein didn’t really notice it. Neither did he notice the ache set deep in his bones from sitting on his creaky old chair for hours on end, nor did he feel his eyes sting after staring at a blank blue screen three feet away from his face for as long as six hours. All he knew was that it made strange sense to him, like the tiny cogs playing their part within a greater, unchallenged system.

The trek leading to a moment of greatness couldn’t be a stroll in the park, after all. It had to carry effort, setbacks, and even more dedication. The path leading to glory couldn't be smooth and easy - it had to be troublesome, it had to be dangerous. Only then could all the blood, sweat and tears mean something in the end.

That trail of thought always helped make the deafening silence that patience brought a bit more bearable.

 

The same silence that had adjusted so well with Jean broke like a clap of thunder one day, when the door behind him suddenly creaked open.

After soft footsteps, came the telltale question: “Anything?”

Jean shook his head, something that was almost second nature to him after fifteen months of repeatedly doing so. He didn’t necessarily mind it. He had learned long ago how to let the disappointment stay in his mind, and not fester in his heart.

Suddenly, the silence that came back didn’t feel right. There was no frustrated sigh, no intense footsteps retreating outside the room, and no banging door - things Jean had grown to expect out of everyone around him, as if it were some law of nature.

Biting his lip, Jean peeled his eyes off of the screen, turning around to glance at the familiar stranger - who was too busy wiping his glasses with the fabric of his tie, with his gaze trained down, and his eyebrows furrowed at the center of his forehead.

 _Marco Bodt and his habits,_ he thought.

A hint of a smile pulled at his lips nevertheless: his friend kept cleaning his aviators that were a little too big on his face, frames that always sat crookedly on the bridge of his nose ever since the day he accidentally sat on them. He would do that whenever he was in a pensive mood, lost in deep thought. Jean wondered if Marco rubbed the golden frames hard enough, maybe some magic charm would appear like a genie leaving its lamp to relieve them of all their problems.

Jean was about to turn back around and resume his place in his own system, when he noticed Marco’s slouched shoulders, his damp collars, and the locks of black hair framing his face, dotted with sweat. He noticed his freckled cheeks and neck flushed pink with exhaustion. He noticed the redness in his eyes, and the bags underneath them. He was tired.

Marco was tired. But he would never say it out loud - he would never admit to it, afraid that others might get bothered. _Another one of his habits._

Suddenly, the silence was too much to bear. Jean coughed, and asked, “Anything on your side?”

Marco, too, shook his head. He let his blue tie fall back onto his chest, as he wore his glasses again. They sat tilted to the right on top of his nose, but Jean knew that Marco knew. He also knew that Marco didn’t care.

“I checked the data thrice, Jean,” he explained, “and checked in with the other stations four times. The black hole in Sagittarius A* is still the only major radio source in our vicinity - the farthest one is the Crab Nebula. Any other body we haven’t caught would either have radio waves too weak to reach Earth, or they’re too far away from us. Other than that… there’s nothing else.”

There’s nothing else, which roughly translated to the infamous phrase: there’s nothing left.

Jean breathed deeply through his nose. If he closed his eyes, he could almost see all his peers, all his seniors, and all his professors sneer at him. _Nothing’s in your favor, Jean. Nothing can give your insignificant life meaning._

Before that inkling of doubt could trickle down to plague his heart again, he let out a slow sigh. He couldn’t let chaos ruin his order of things - he couldn’t relinquish control so soon.

He glanced at the window behind him. It had grown darker now, the purple evening sky giving way to a night as black as pitch, and as silent as space itself.

The night was dark and nostalgic.

It reminded Jean of the night it all started: he was back at the Trost Institution, where renowned professors of their region carried out extensive research on the various components of cosmic rays coming from space. As simple as that motive sounded, the efforts had been groundbreaking; one could find a number of things hidden in the universe just by deciphering what the nature of those cosmic rays were - dying stars, burning comets, and even gaping black holes.

Simply being in that institution was a privilege for Jean - and being an assistant researcher there a golden opportunity.

Jean remembered finding every chance he could to spend time within the lecture halls and research rooms - especially the “Brain of Trost”: the main research lab where all the readings were collected from high-end computers and scanners, all the data was processed from their top-notch radio telescopes, and all the deductions were made. It was the spirit of the entire place - its very soul.

He remembered one night he had spent a staggering 15 minutes within that room, with an excuse that he was just going to collect some papers from a professor there. It felt like he had spent ages strolling down the room, with computers bordering the edges, and a large oval table placed at the center. He had never seen its mahogany surface bare; it was always covered with files, books bigger than his face, and papers hatched, crumpled or just simply torn.

Was it luck or was the universe kind to him that day, but the room happened to be completely empty, with a few screens still alight, lining the desks and the walls. He had spent too long staring at them, knowing each of their purposes by heart; one measured the erratic X-ray spectrum coming from Cygnus X-1, a star system that was later discovered to be a black hole. Another screen marked the infrared radiations emitting from the nucleus of the Andromeda Galaxy. Ultraviolet rays coming from stars both thriving and deceased, gamma rays coming from stars ten times bigger and brighter than the Sun - they all marked their existence in that room. Within their technicalities, Jean could see the fabric of space unfold. Within their sophisticated mechanisms, he could see the Universe being born. It made him feel larger than life, and yet smaller than a speck of dust.

He remembered how the childlike fascination suddenly changed to shock when he spotted a lone screen flickering blue at the farthest, darkest end of the room. When he stepped closer, he saw how it was giving the most erratic, most random readings of radio wave emissions - from no source in particular. No star, no planet, certainly no black hole. He could remember the awe dawning upon him: _where are you coming from?_

Suddenly, the readings became impossibly wild, exceeding the normal values planets like Jupiter habitually emitted. This is not normal.

At that point, his feet had a mind of their own; he dropped everything, and immediately ran to fetch the only person he knew who cared: Professor Hange.

She was, as expected, busy scribbling it all over a blackboard as tall as the room itself, processing data for their next project. She was leaning dangerously at the edge of the ladder, and almost fell when Jean barged in.

But he couldn’t control himself. He had to drag her out, had to convince her that they were onto something huge. _Something grand,_ he remembered believing at the time, with a fire burning in his belly.

He still remembered how quickly that fire burned out when he went back to the Brain Of Trost, only to see the blue screen blank. The readings were gone.

It can’t be, he had thought. It can’t be. Puzzled, Jean had to scan through the data stored in their log, having forgotten that he wasn’t technically allowed to do so without a professor’s permission. His breaths were short, and his heart slammed against his chest when he checked the graphs - there were no spikes, no irregular readings. Nothing.

By the time he had raised his head to look around, he and Professor Hange weren’t alone; there were two other senior professors in the same room, fuming at the audacity of an assistant researcher entering and using data from the Brain with such callous confidence.

“What is the meaning of this?!” one of them, Professor Erwin, exclaimed. “Professor Hange, explain yourself!”

Before she could make an excuse for Jean, he stepped forward and explained the situation. No way was he going to let her take the blame. _I know what I saw,_ he remembered thinking with such ego _. I know I’m right._

But the professors refused to accept it, even when he had explained everything. “The data doesn’t lie, boy,” a short, more stout, professor spoke from behind Professor Mike. He held his suspenders tight with paper-mache pride, and spoke through his thick moustache, “The graphs in the log don’t show shit, and neither does the telescope. You can’t expect radio waves to come out of nothing - and acting like a smart-ass won’t help.”

Jean didn’t wince at his crude language. Instead, he took another defiant step forward, and continued, “Professor, with all due respect, I know what I saw. The source might have been screened by some moving object, something we’re not familiar with yet-”

“Not familiar with?” he repeated. Sweat beaded all over his balding head. “We’ve been carrying out research for decades. Let me assure you - we would have found something so major ourselves ages ago.”

 _Shut up Jean_ , logic whispered to him. “Just because you’ve scoured the Universe for so long doesn’t mean you’ve discovered everything,” he blurted out instead. “You can’t just- just stop if the readings don’t show up-”

“You can count on your fairytale fantasies that belief will help you make your dreams come true, boy. Let us deal with facts and figures - just the way it's supposed to be amongst physicists.”

Jean bit back a snarl, but the bitterness made its way in his tone either way. “I’m _not_ crazy-”

But the fat professor had scoffed right at his face, spittle flying everywhere. “If you’re not crazy, then maybe the Universe is against you, boy.”

Those brash words had reverberated through Jean back then, and they did even in the present. The confusion, the frustration, the pain - it all tightened his chest, as if he were drowning. He blinked a few times, and found himself back in their desolate station, back before the same blue screen.

Still blank, as it had been fifteen months ago.

He turned back around to look at Marco, who was still standing, now with his arms folded. Motivated as always. Loyal as always.

Marco was about to say something, with how he kept biting his lip, and Jean knew what he was about to say. He beat him to the chase:

“Marco, you look like a walking corpse,” he said. He swivelled his chair around, facing his dear screen once more. The creak echoed as he continued, “You should go home. I’ll shut down the place myself tonight when I’m done.”

Of course Marco gave no immediate response. Of course when he spoke again, it was entirely unrelated to his statement:

“Have you eaten anything?”

“Yes,” he lied.

“You’re lying.”

“Then why did you ask-”

“This is going too far, don’t you think, Jean?”

The question wasn’t forceful or angry. It hung in the air without threat, without venom, and certainly without malice.

It made Jean lose track of his own thoughts, catching him off guard. He could feel one of the cogs that was once so perfectly aligned in his little system suddenly fall out. It took all of his composure to respond as softly as he could without turning around:

“What do you mean?”

“Don’t get me wrong, this is your project and you’re allowed to do whatever you want, but… it’s one thing to work hard to reach your goal, but another to work hard just to lose yourself in the end.”

 _I know where this is going_. Before Jean had to deal with more components of his delicate system unraveling, he spoke in a dangerously low voice, “Marco, I’m gonna say this once. I am fine.”

Of course it didn’t reach his ears. “You’re not fooling anybody, Jean. Look at you! You’re losing your health - nothing can be worth losing yourself like this!”

That was the last straw. “What would you know?” he hissed, turning around to stare at his friend coldly. “How can you say that, when you know _nothing_?”

By then, the system he held so dearly disintegrated. Now, he was on his feet, and his voice was loud and on the point of breaking: “Don’t you dare say that to me when it's my life that has been nothing but a series of disappointments, one after another. After years of fighting the- the odds against me, this is the only chance I’ve got to prove something. You don’t understand what I’m willing to do for this. I could lose everything I have, everything that I am for this small moment - it's all I fucking have left!”

During the spur of it all, he lost control of his arms and struck an entire pile of research papers and two half-filled paper cups of coffee. It all took just two seconds - and the entire mass fell onto the floor.

Jean swore, and immediately swept down to save his research. Although he salvaged half of them, the mess had been catastrophic still; he could see some of his calculations blur because of the coffee staining it, making the ink and pencil markings bleed.

He didn’t realise how frantically he was scavenging the floor for his papers, how profusely he was swearing underneath his breath. All he could feel was the same constricting feeling binding his chest, making it hard to breathe. All he knew was the thought dawning in his mind: _I’ve never screamed at Marco like that._

But then, Marco grabbed his hands, and gripped them time. He didn’t let them go, even though his fingers were damp with old coffee. And as soon as he looked up to stare at his brown eyes, the white noise finally gave way to silence. Still silence.

He still didn’t let go. He only looked at him hard, not blinking once.

Jean couldn’t call the look in Marco’s eyes anger, or frustration. He couldn’t call it remorse, or sadness, or pity. Like a night sky with no clouds, his eyes were too crystal clear for those emotions.

It was concern. Marco was only concerned.

Jean felt a bitter taste at the back of his mouth when he realised he wasn’t a stranger to that look either.

It was the same look Jean had seen gazing down at him back at Trost Institution, when he had been sitting on the ground with his head in his hands, beaten by the day. He had just asked the higher ups for permission to gain access to the small research station at the Mina District. He continuously argued that even though it was terribly understaffed and almost running down to its demise due to disuse, it didn’t have to be like that - not with his new motive to find the source of that mystery eruption of radio waves. He had asked 10 times by then, and got rejected 11 times. By then, Jean had no arrogant confidence left to cling onto, as he felt his motivation dwindle away to nothingness. _Who’s left to support me?_ he wondered, his hands pulling at his hair. _Who’s going to take my side if the entire world won’t?_

He got his answer in the form of a young freckled man with crooked aviator spectacles sitting across his nose. He stared down at him without the pity his professors would give him due to his failed attempts, and without the venom his peers would give him due to his ‘ego’. At the time, Marco Bodt was simply concerned.

He had asked if something was wrong, as if Jean were some childhood friend, and not someone who’s name he had learned only a week ago. His immediate reaction was to shy away like a wounded animal, saying something along the lines of “it’s none of your business”, but apparently Marco didn’t hear it. Either that, or he simply didn’t care - because he then proceeded to sit beside him, with his legs crossed, and eyes trained right at him.

“Tell me what’s wrong.”

It wasn’t even a question - it sounded a lot like an order Jean couldn’t refuse. Gulping dryly, he inclined. He had planned to tell him about the situation only from its surface, but ended up dishing out every detail; he told him about the night he found the erratic readings of radio waves from space two weeks prior, and how they vanished completely moments later. He also told him about the animosity that incident had created between him and the higher ups, making them reject Jean’s request to research the mystery on his own.

“I know I sound crazy, asking for special rights as if I’m some prince,” Jean sighed after he was done explaining, “but- but I can’t make this up. I might sound crazy, but this is something huge. I can feel it in my gut - this has to mean something… right?”

At the time, he expected Marco to respond to his rhetorical question. He even expected a laugh out of him, mocking him for dreaming such big dreams with such little support. But all he got was silence.

So when he turned to look at Marco, he was... busy cleaning his glasses with his tie. His cheeks glowed red with heat, and the tip of his tongue poked out of his mouth in sheer concentration.

 _An odd habit_ , he thought at the time, raising an eyebrow. But before either of them could say anything, Professor Mike saw the both of them slack off, and shooed them both back to their regular stations.

The next time both had an encounter was four days later, though in very different circumstances. Jean had received his first break after countless hours of filing in and sending research papers for the ultrasound emissions coming from potential galaxies farther away from the Milky Way. His bones were aching by that time, and a quick smoke was all he needed.

He was half way through it, contemplating the next speech he had to give to the higher ups. But then, he was interrupted by someone:

“I wouldn’t smoke right now if I were you.”

He turned around, squinting at the intruder - it was Marco. He was leaning against the door frame opening to the smoking area, with his tie loose around his neck, and his sleeves pulled over his elbows.

At the time, Jean was especially bothered by his statement. He puffed out a stream of smoke from his nose, just to spite him. “What’s that supposed to mean?” he then asked, his voice low.

Marco only glanced at his watch, silently stepping closer and closer to him, until he was only a few feet away from his face.

His tone was almost cheeky when he said, “Because you’re gonna be called for in a while.”

“Called for? By whom?”

“I can’t say who exactly, but it’ll happen. In fact, it’ll happen in exactly…” he paused, observing his watch. “20 seconds.”

_What?_

The ash fell from the tip of his cigarette onto his shoe, and before he could take another drag, Marco stole it right from his fingers.

“Hey!” he exclaimed. “What’s the meaning of this!”

Marco had the audacity to smile at him, a dimple poking at his cheek as he snubbed the cigarette on top of the dumpster behind him.

“Straighten your tie,” he advised instead of apologizing, “and do something about your hair-”

“I’m not playing games here,” Jean seethed, alarmed at how seemingly calmly Marco took the situation, as if it were a joke. He pointed a finger at him, about to let loose - but then got interrupted by a knock.

He glanced at his left, to find a young blond intern, peeking through the door frame, seemingly afraid he had just gotten himself in the middle of a brawl. The poor boy’s voice was quivering when he said:

“Professor Hange is calling for you, Mr. Kirschtein.”

Jean still remembered how he stopped breathing at that moment, but could simultaneously feel his heart hammer against his chest. He could still recall the shock that settled in - and the look on Marco’s face when he took the lighter out of his hand, replaced it with three mints, and ushered him to ‘get a move on’.

And so he did; his feet were already moving, speeding through the halls and alleys memorized by heart, and stopping right before Professor Hange’s office.

He knocked twice, waited until he heard an abrupt “come in!”, and stepped inside quietly. The otherwise spacious office looked so cramped with piles of research papers and books standing as tall as Jean on the tables and the floor. There were bookshelves packed thick with books regarding the intricate laws of physics and mathematics. That was normal - but what wasn’t normal was the somber look on the professor’s face.

It all unfolded within seconds: she approached him, and quietly handed him a piece of paper. His permission slip.

He remembered reading it five times to let reality sink in.

“This may come as a surprise, Jean,” she spoke, in an impossibly soft voice, so unlike her. “but I believe in your instinct. The station at Mina District is open for research. If needed, you both can rally a few of our researchers and interns, just so they can get some exposure without saturating Trost Institution - only under the condition that they aren’t stationed there permanently. Other than that, you and your friend have to find whatever you’re looking for within two years of starting this project.”

“M-my friend?”

“Yeah, Marco Bodt.”

His mouth fell open. Marco Bodt, the boy he barely knew - this was his doing?

Regardless, Jean bowed countless times, thanking Professor Hange again and again for giving him her support. Before leaving the room, though, she had said something with a hint of a smile:

“That boy, Marco Bodt - keep him close, will you? He’s remarkably bright; you’ll need his energy.”

He kept on pondering over that statement throughout the evening as he sat amidst the shrubs outside the Trost Institution alone, with their famous radio telescopes as his only companions. It only made sense when he got interrupted by his freckled partner, standing in front of him with a proud grin, and an extended hand. He remembered shaking it with an iron grip. It felt warm.

It was hard to forget that warmth radiating through his body like the rays of the Sun, even after so many months. And now, when he felt the same heat spreading underneath his skin through Marco’s stare, Jean finally felt how cold he truly was.

He didn’t realise how much his hands were shaking as soon as Marco held them. Embarrassed, he ducked his head so that he didn’t have to feel any more worse than he already did. He could already feel a crack caving inside his chest, growing larger and deeper - until Marco squeezed his hands.

He looked up, and his friend only had one thing to say.

“Let's go outside. Please?”

Numbly, pathetically, Jean nodded. Like some disoriented baby deer, he got up and went outside with Marco beside him.

The cold night air was the first thing that greeted them, enveloping them like a long lost friend’s hug. They both headed towards their only one recluse within their empty wasteland - their very own radio telescope.

It was nowhere as grand as the one in the Trost Institution, and it most certainly wasn’t their own - but it had sentimental value. Professor Hange had snuck in a few of her own trained assistants without the higher ups knowing, and helped the two not only reinstall some computers and fix all the aerials and antennas, but also revive the only radio telescope in that vicinity, growing obsolete every second. They did a great job, but it was all they could do - Professor Hange couldn’t risk anymore interference. After that, they were on their own.

It would be an understatement to say that they had to start from scratch. Although the computers and the telescope functioned, they had to decide what exactly they were looking for - without the mess of searching for answers in plain nothingness.

Jean still remembered the hours they slaved sitting at the table, crossing out one theory after another on what could the source of radio waves be, and where could they be coming from. He still remembered the sleepless nights they spent filling every blackboard they could find with diagrams explaining every possibility of their origin. He remembered the sweat across his brow, the ache in his bones, and the tension coiling in his gut.

At some point, he stopped walking, still staring at the station now a good ten feet away from them. How could he forget those things? There wasn’t a theory they both hadn’t tackled, an idea they didn’t apply and then cancel out, or a second they ever wasted. They never really stopped or gave up. They both always kept going.

Jean didn’t understand exactly how was he still standing with the same defiance he had back at Trost Institution the day he told his higher ups that they were wrong, despite months of no results. He didn’t know why was he still there, with the same conviction that there had to be something out there in space, waiting to be discovered by him, and him only - as if he were some special snowflake. He didn’t know why he stood there in the cold, cruel night, with the same dream of changing the world as he had had since he was a quivering child, locked in his room while his parents drunkenly fought in the kitchen over and over again.

Jean didn’t know how was he still standing despite falling so many times. All he knew was that it had something to do with Marco.

“Jean?”

The quiet voice broke his state of reverie, and he turned his head around. Marco was on the ground, sat next to their good old radio telescope. _Come here,_ he motioned.

Jean obliged, walking onwards and proceeding to sit next to his friend. The pebbles dug into his skin, and he was sure the grainy sand was going to ruin his only good pair of dress pants left - but in that moment of time, he couldn’t care; not when the dry wasteland surrounding the two of them was vast, and empty. It almost felt as if they were the only two people left in the entire world. In that lonely thought, Jean found a moment’s comfort.

Before the silence grew stagnant, Marco let out a huge sigh. Stretching his arms out to the sky, he leaned back more and more, till he laid flat on the ground.

In that moment, Jean sneakily pulled out a dented - but whole - cigarette.

He successfully lit it up, the ashes burning like gold in the darkness. But just when he was about to bring it to his lips, Marco immediately leaned up and snatched the cigarette out of his hands.

In another time, Jean might have gotten in a fist fight over such childish antics. But at the moment, he only chuckled. He looked to his right, to see his friend lay back on the ground, taking a long, slow drag from the same cigarette before snubbing it in the sand.

Marco let out a plume of white smoke out of his mouth. As its fumes began to vanish, Jean asked, “There’s nobody here, so why can’t I smoke now? Is there someone who’s gonna call for me?”

Marco gave a thoughtful pause, before nodding.

Jean raised an eyebrow. “Who?”

“Maybe its the universe.”

Jean almost believed Marco was joking, and he was about to laugh at him, but then a breeze began to blow across the land. It felt cold, it smelled of nothing, and it came from nowhere - but it instantly made Jean lose his trail of thought. He knew the two of them were alone, but he didn’t feel lonely. Could it actually be the universe giving them both company? Was that possible? After living a life in constant rebellion with the cruel ways of the universe, it was hard to believe that it could one day give something to Jean that he had never received before: sympathy.

(It was hard, yes - but with Marco by his side, it didn’t feel impossible.)

Marco’s question broke his state of reverie:

“You know what’s crazy?”

Jean lifted his legs and hugged his knees, listening. “What is?”

“We’re astrophysicists in the making, right? Scientists who study space. We’re people who scavenge through every corner of the universe, mapping things like black holes, planets, comets - but we never really... look at the stars. Not once have we looked at them with our own eyes. Not once have we realized how beautiful they are.”

That made Jean look up at the sky. He expected to see nothing but inky, empty blackness continuing for miles. Instead, he saw an explosion of stars unfold before his eyes. Jean was sure if he reached his hands upwards just a little, then he might be able to touch them. He might be able to hold them in his hands - the remnants of the universe. It was mesmerizing to say the least.

He let himself lean back against his arms, hands resting on the ground beneath him. Tilting his chin up, he basked in the sight before them, like a painting the universe painted just for the two of them to enjoy. It truly was beautiful.

Like a pebble dropping into the ocean, the tiny ripples of thought grew into ponderous waves in Jean’s mind - until he had to break the silence:

“Y’know what else is crazy?”

“What?” came Marco’s soft response. It sounded as if he were smiling.

“Those stars possess carbon, oxygen, hydrogen, nitrogen - elements that make up the human body. That means there's always a non-zero probability that some percentage of the elements making up who am I today might have come from those stars - they must have. There’s always this chance that... that we all have stars inside of us.”

Jean laughed at nothing, and at everything - and he couldn’t remember the last time he smiled like that. “The chance is small, I know, but it isn't entirely zero. Meaning we-”

“-we can’t call ourselves unimportant, ordinary, or insignificant - because we’re part of something as big as the universe. We’re… much greater than what we think we are.”

It was as if Marco read the rest of Jean’s thought, and spoke it fluently, word for word. Jean glanced at his side, to find his friend bathed in starlight, staring not at the stars he was just admiring, but at him, with his eyes glowing.

Of course he was smiling. Of course he made Jean feel warm even in the cold. He had been feeling this way around him ever since he met him at the Trost Institution, ever since he helped him pave the road reaching to his dreams.

The thought made him wonder again; the waves in his mind were growing wilder and stronger, towering over reason, sweeping past logic, till they crashed into uncharted land. He wished there were some theory, or some form of equation that could help explain the feelings inside of him. His heart beat fast, his breaths became dangerously shallow - and he had no clue why.

(All he knew was that it had something to do with Marco.)

He found his voice trapped somewhere in his throat - licking his lips, he asked:

“Why did you sign up for this?”

Silence. And then: “Define ‘ _this_ ’.”

“ _This_ \- this, as in, this place. This run down station in the middle of nowhere. This life of stagnancy - where every day passing is 24 hours wasted by staring at a screen expecting some- some miracle that will never happen. This perpetual loop of disappointment playing on repeat every fucking day - why did you sign up for all this?”

(Why did you sign up for potential failure with me?)

Silence again. Marco sat back up slowly, letting out a deep sigh. He mirrored Jean’s position, head still tilted to stare at the stars above. They were dancing in his brown eyes. Even in the dark, I can see them - how strange. How breathtaking.

It was after forever that he said, “Say you went up to a priest, and you ask, ‘ _Father, do you believe in God?_ ’, what will he say?”

“Of course he’ll say yes.” Where is this going?

“Why?”

“Because it's what his religion calls for.”

“Take religion out of the picture. Think of his mind, his heart - why is he believing in a Higher Being, if he knows he can’t see Him, can’t feel Him, and can’t provide hardcore evidence of His existence?”

Jean’s mind had gone on overdrive by now, trying to come up with a hundred different outcomes of this debate, but finding no plausible end result. He furrowed his brow still, answering his question the only way he could: “Because it’s something he chooses to believe in.”

That made him smile. “And there’s the answer to your question.”

“I don’t… understand...”

“It’s one thing to come up with a potential discovery, but it's different when you have to fight for it. The whole world was against Einstein’s ideas, and he still fought for them till they changed the face of Physics, right? It takes guts to do that - and I just… I saw that drive in you, ever since we first spoke. I saw that fire - and call me poetic, but that day, I decided I didn’t want it to go out.”

He sat up straighter, and came closer. The night light made the freckles across his cheeks show up like an entire galaxy.

“So I signed up for this because it’s what I’ve chosen to believe, with everything I have. Because you’ve been fighting for it as hard as anyone, and it’s made me want to join in and help. It’s strange to confess like this, but… belief in your drive has made me believe in this universe being much more meaningful than it already is.” He scoffed then, glancing at the ground. “It’s funny, but where you’re seeing disappointment everyday, I’m only seeing hope.”

A gust of wind swept Jean’s hair in his eyes, but before he could move them away, Marco lifted his right hand, tucking his hair behind his ear.

“I signed up for this because I believe you,” he whispered, thumb tracing his cheek. “And I don’t care how long it takes. Months, years, decades - I’ll still be here. You’ll reach the stars, Jean, I know you will - and I’ll take you there, if that’s what it'll take.”

There was just static, and nothing else. Jean’s hands were shaking, his heart on the brink of exploding, and horrifically, his mind couldn’t come up with a single coherent thought. It was as if all his education had given up on him. His body, though - oh, it had a mind of its own. Under pure instinct, his hands wildly grabbed Marco’s collars, and he pulled him close.

It was once Jean could feel fireworks bursting inside his chest that he realised he was kissing Marco.

Marco sighed, holding Jean’s jaw with both his hands, tilting his head to press one kiss, then another, and then another. His glasses kept digging into his skin, but Jean didn't care. He was lost by then, tearing down every wall he ever built, and letting go of every guard he ever put up. For once, he gave in, feeling heat sear his skin from the inside out. He felt stars live and die and then reborn inside of him. For once, he felt free.

It was after forever that they broke apart slowly, foreheads still pressed. Jean kept his eyes shut, afraid that when he’ll open them, he’ll only see an empty blue screen, with the bells of failure ringing in his ears. He didn’t want this to go away.

Jean wanted to burst into tears. He wanted to break something, wanted to scream - because how could he deserve something like that? How could he be worthy of kindness when cruelty is all he’s ever given, all he’s ever received? How could he accept love when he has no idea of what it feels like?

It was a soft kiss to his cheek that made him open his eyes. When he did, all he saw were brown eyes, brimming with something that looked a lot like love. All he saw was Marco. His Marco.

And at that moment, it felt as if all his venomous thoughts dissolved. The stars were aligned, and everything felt… okay.

 

It could have lasted for as long as forever - until Marco glanced above Jean’s head, and his jaw fell open.

“Why is it blinking red…?”

_What?_

He turned around to see it for himself - and there, as sure as the night surrounding them, the indicator aerial beside the radio telescope was blinking red.

Without a word, they both rushed back into their station, barging through the door, approaching their secluded computer room -

 _Beep. Beep. Beep._ The sound was faint, but Jean heard it, as soon as he held the rusty door knob. He swallowed thickly, and wrenched it open, to find a single computer screen lit up in an otherwise dark room - with readings on it.

Jean couldn’t believe it, and Marco’s gasp from behind him brought him back to Earth. With shaky legs, he stumbled forward, collapsed on his chair, stared at the screen with his mouth open.

Before he could truly understand what had just happened, though, he noticed something else.

“The readings… they’re not random.”

Marco asked, “What do you mean?”

“They were too erratic the last time I saw them,” Jean realised, tracing the incoming radio wave signals on the screen. “I'm not saying these make sense, but... But there's some kind of order. Look at those peaks, and then those flat lines... They don't feel random."

Like a bolt of lightning, it struck him:

“Is it… Morse code?”

“Morse code?!”

“Look - those peaks are dots, the flat lines are dashes… this has to mean something. The signals made no sense back at the Institute, but here it has more structure. This makes sense!”

“But Jean, how can you be sure…?”

“I don’t know,” he stuttered, turning to look at Marco, hoping he understood that this time he had no explanation. “I just- I just know it, Marco.”

There was a moment’s hesitation in Marco’s eyes, and Jean’s heart stopped beating for a second. The doubt left as soon as it came, and he nodded with the same determination he had had for a year. He grabbed the nearest paper and pencil he could find, and immediately began his work.

The peaks were dots, and the flat lines the dashes… it had to mean something.

A few minutes’ scribbling felt like centuries worth of research - until the pencil dropped from Marco’s hand.

He held up the paper in his hand. The message said, “You found us. And we have found you.”

 

_You found us. And we have found you._

 

Jean looked at the message, and then back at the screen. He felt Marco hold his hand, and he didn’t know whose was shaking harder. All Jean knew was that he was that he didn’t want to let go. All he knew was that they did it. They finally did it.

It felt as if the universe finally let Jean feel significant - and it definitely had something to do with Marco.

**Author's Note:**

> Please enjoy this as a gift from me to you guys for being patient with me during my absence.
> 
> Expect a lot more writing adventures from me from now onwards! (Yes, that include The Silent Ones!)
> 
> Do leave a comment if you have constructive criticisms or some other thoughts to share, I'd love to interact! Here are my [Twitter](https://mobile.twitter.com/kirschtrash?lang=en) and [Tumblr](http://kirschtrash.tumblr.com) accounts!
> 
> Until next time, take care!


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